LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

§\n{ubL(^np^ntf^i ;|a, 



UNITED STATES OF AMERIC 



d 



The thoughts of war overpozver all others. . . But at last conduR 
the zvorld to freedojii. — Byron. 



COLLECTIONS 



Coffee.-. Cooler, 



■CONSISTING OF 

DAILY PRISON vSCENES IN ANDERSONVILLE, GA., AND 
FLORENCE, S. C, WITH POETIC EFFUSIONS ON FOR- 
AGING, ARMY BEANS, ARMY CORNS, SOLDIER'S 
ORATION, vSOLDlER'S WIDOW, SOLDIER'S 
DEATH, AND THE SOLDIER'S FUNE- 



RAL, SILENT SENTINELS, Etc. ^-^.v^v oFCo/V(»rS. 

.VlA!a2l890, 



•^^SHinGTOV*' 



S. CREELMAN 



Late Co. A 101st Reg't Penn'a Vols., who served forty-six montlis in 
the Army, inclusive of eleven months in Prison Pens. 



ADDRESS : 
WlIvKINSBURG, AlvLEGHENY COUNTY, PENN'A, BOX 196. 



Entered according to Act of Congress in tlie year i88g, by S. Creehnan, in the Office 
of the Librarian of Congress, at IVashington, D. C. 



'■t-r 



PRESS OF 

The Pittsburg Photo-Engraving Co. 

1890. 



PRISON LIFE. 



VVitJi Scenes and Incidents as seen and experienced 

during the year 1864, in Andersonville, 

Ga., and Florence, S. C. 




treatment and disease. 



HE Military Prison 
at Andersonville, 
Sumpter county, Ga., 
during our late civil 
war had a representa- 
tive from almost every 
city, county, town and 
village from Maine to 
California. Thirty- 
two thousand prison- 
ers of war were con- 
fined there and four- 
teen thousand died 
from exposure, cruel 
Andersonville is situate in 



Sumpter county, sixty-nine miles south of Macon, 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



and on the railroad from Macon to Americus ; the 
census report would not be diminished greatly with- 
out it, the occupants of one dwelling with the addi- 
tion of two or three smaller huts or cabins comprise 
the total population. A small rivulet from its source 
near Anderson station, winds its way perhaps one- 
fourth of a mile until it enters the stockade and 
through the prison in an easterly direction, forming 
a tributary of the Flint. So much by way of des- 
cription geographically. 

Was captured with our command at Plymouth, 
North Carolina, on April 20, 1864, after three days' 
battle, by the Confederate General Hoke's command, 
aided by the iron clad ram Albemarle, and after 
delivering to our captors our arms and accoutre- 
ments were marched outside the town and given one 
day's rations for three days' marching; a speedy 
introduction to the new bill of fare. We arrived at 
Tarboro, N. C, tired and hungry ; corn-meal was 
given us in limited quantity, the Tar river supplied 
us water, and chips and bark were used as a sub- 
stitute for spoons. We were from this place ship- 
ped by rail to Rocky Mount on the Weldon railroad, 
and wondering quietly, but attentively, how many 
soldiers could be conveniently packed in a freight 



COLIvECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



car in a standing position without annoying or dis- 
commoding each other. The next place of import- 
ance on our route was Goldsburgf, on the Neuse ; 
here we received one day's rations of damaged 
crackers, which had a tendency to preserve Hfe until 
we arrived at Wilmington, on the Cape Fear; here 
we noticed the blockade runners loading and unload- 
ing ; we received bread by way of variety, the quality 
was not to be complained of as much as the quantity. 
Some of the prisoners amused themselves, during 
their leisure time, in setting fire to a cotton factory, 
which detained our train for a time. Next day, being- 
Sunday, we found ourselves in the city of Charleston, 
South Carolina ; nothing worthy of note occurred at 
this place except that the train ran off the track, which 
event gave us an opportunity to solicit periodicals 
and books for future study and perusal. After a 
few hours' delay we were again on the iron rails in 
open, or uncovered cars on our way to Savannah 
Junction, three miles northeast of Savannah, Ga., at 
which place we arrived about dusk, and after being 
transferred to box cars, were soon whirling over the 
rice fields along the valleys of the Ogeeche,- Oconee 
and Ocmulgee to Macon, and southwest past Ogle- 
thorpe, to our destination, tired, weary, hungry, but 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



satisfied that we were done riding- on railroads under 
such unhappy circumstances. The distance from 
Plymouth, N. C, to Andersonville being nine 
hundred miles by the above described route, or an 
average of ninety miles per day, from April 20, to 
May 3, making an allowance of three days for greas- 
ing, stalling and gathering in wood, water, etc., 
along the route. After arriving at Andersonville 
we were formed into line and introduced and made 
acquainted with Capt. Henry Wertz, who made him- 
self so famous by his cruel and unjust treatment of 
defenseless prisoners of war. With revolver in hand 
he ordered us to fall in line and remain in that posi- 
tion until further orders, as anything like disobedi- 
ence would result in death ; and after a short delay 
we were marched to the stockade ; the strong, pond- 
erous gates on the north side opened on their mas- 
sive iron hinges. We all marched in, but many were 
carried out. 

We examined our surroundings and made a few 
melancholy observations, musing in deep soliloquy, 
thinking that "man's inhumanity to man makes 
countless thousands mourn." After meditating we 
began to explore and investigate, and observed a 
long line of dead inside the dead line, placed there 



COU.ECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 7 

to be taken to the dead house during the day, with 
faces and feet uncovered, clothes worn and torn ; a. 
label on the breast, pinned to the slender, thread-bare 
garments, told us the name, regiment, date of death, 
etc. We turned from the dead to look at the living; 
some were enorapfed at cookine what we afterwards 
found to be a very poor selection of cornmeal, both 
as regards quality and quantity ; others were industri- 
ously at work at a root trying to manufacture it into 
a bundle of wood ; some were trying the experiment 
of washing their Indian or copper colored hands and 
faces clean and white without the aid of soap, an 
undertaking which generally resulted in failure ; some 
carrying and peddling a small can or boot-leg of 
water trying to dispose of it by sale or in exchange 
for tobacco ; others still were destroying vermin, 
which were numerous and very destructive of com- 
fort, peace or rest, and in many instances of life ; it 
was obligatory with one and all of us to be active 
and vigilant, as existence depended in the open 
violation of the sixth commandment of the Jewish 
decalogue. Some were swearing about the hard 
fortunes of war and occasionally added a word or 
two not complimentary to the Confederates. Others 
again were grouped together relating the scenes of 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



battlefields, of the doleful present, of the dreary 
prospect for the near future. Some were dying, far 
from home, its comforts and cushioned beds. 

The Belle-Isle and Richmond prisoners had been 
sent here before us. They were supplied with small 
pans, pots and other cooking utensils. We, fortu- 
nately, had some money, and the result was a system 
of trading was adopted. On the north side and also 
on the south side were two streets somewhat wider 
than the others, made so for the purpose of bringing 
in wood, meal and mush ; on these streets were 
to be found prisoners trading. One onion or potato 
would bring one dollar, one pound of salt two dol- 
lars ; corn-meal was traded for corn-bread, a stray 
beef-bone that had, perhaps, been boiled a dozen 
times, would bring a handsome figure, and finally be 
converted into rings and other mementoes. Hearing 
a comrade advertise coffee for sale or exchange, we 
ventured to inquire the price of the soldiers' much- 
loved stimulant, and being informed that it was 
worth twenty-five cents per small spoonful, we 
inquired the wholesale price, and after a few remarks 
about quality and quantity, we bought the entire 
stock — sack, wooden spoon, fixtures, good will and 
all — and after boiling and cooking it. made the dis- 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



covery that it had been boiled previously and the 
grounds dried in the sun, and sold and resold per- 
haps twenty times. 

Sometimes we received cooked rations, consistinQ^ 
of rice and corn bread. The bread was baked in 
hot iron pans, and generally well cooked on the 
outside or crust, while inside could be found its 
primative condition. The rice was often unpalate- 
able on account of the absence of milk and sugar 
and other condiments Part of the time we received 
meal. We would then cook to suit our fancy, but 
were frequently governed by the quantity of meal 
and fael. The meal was of a poor quality, often 
mixed with corn-silk and other products of the corn, 
and would average a pint per day to each prisoner. 
Salt was about as plentiful as diamonds, and like 
that valuable mineral only valuable on account of its 
extreme scarceness. 

The cook-house was situated on the west and 
upper side of the prison, and close by the small 
stream of water running into and through the prison. 
The cooked rations were brought into the stockade in 
two-horse wagons containing large dry-goods boxes 
filled with mush or rice, the drivers with laro-e shovels 
fillinQ- a certain number of wooden buckets full for 



10 COIvLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



each detachment. The regularity of the ration wagon 
depended on the condition of the weather ; an even- 
ing storm was a signal for a fast, and the length of 
the fast depended on the length of the storm. 

In regard to the dead-line, much has been 
written and told by released prisoners. Ten feet 
Inside the stockade strips about two inches wide and 
four feet long were driven in the ground, about 
twelve feet apart from each other. Wooden strips 
were nailed on top around the entire length of the 
prison. Such is a brief description of the dreaded 
and dangerous dead-line. An unguarded step, an 
accidental fall, a misstep, resulted in instant death. 
The place where the water entered the prison was 
the most dangerous. So many thousands compelled 
to get water at one place, and in endeavoring to get 
clear water, would reach too far under the dead- 
line, and the smoke from the sentinel's gun told the 
sad tale. Attempts to tunnel out were frequent, 
but seldom successful ; some one would turn traitor, 
and for his selfish service would get out on parole; 
and frequently the prison authorities would make 
soundings with a long, sharpened iron or spike 
inside the dead-line, and should a prisoner be so 
successful in o-ettinof outside unnoticed the blood- 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 11 

hounds were always kept in readiness to obey the 
commands of their keeper, and the escaped prisoner, 
if not registered next roll-call, would be found shortly 
afterward in the dead-house. 

The stockade was built of laro-e, pine timber, 
about the size of the largest timbers used in building 
barns, roughly hewed, placed in an upright position 
in an excavation ; projecting about twelve or fifteen 
feet in height, with sentry boxes on top about forty 
feet distant from each other, reached by steps from 
the ground outside. No fancy mechanical work nor 
beautiful finish to feast the artistic eye upon, but for 
strength and durability unexcelled. Another stock- 
ade was erected outside, about one hundred feet dis- 
tant from the one described above, thus makinor 
escape above ground as perilous as the tunneling pro- 
cess. Sickness and disease found a coneenial clime 
in the dirt and filth of Andersonville; the dead-house 
was seldom without its silent occupants, and the 
wagons used for hauling the dead were seldom idle. 
The months of July and August were the most sickly 
time, and the number of deaths exceeded those of 
any other months. One hundred and twenty was the 
highest number of deaths reported on any one day. 
Doctors were in attendance at the hospital, and the 



12 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



sick were carried from all parts of the prison each 
morning- to the south-side ofate, to receive such atten- 
tion and medicines as the prison authorities were able 
or willinof to bestow on the numberless sick and 
afflicted captives. All cases of a serious nature 
were taken to the outside hospital, under the shade 
of the friendly pines ; but the food was so uninviting 
and unpalatable, and the vermin so annoyincr and 
troublesome that few recovered. Another source of 
suffering was the insufficient quantity of wood received 
for cooking our meager rations. With forest in 
view to the east and south, we were given a two- 
horse wagon load every two or three days for six 
detachments, or sixteen hundred and twenty pris- 
oners. Equalized, it would make a strip for each 
one about the size of a rung of a chair. 

The Gangreen Hospital was located some dis- 
tance from the other hospital. Its occupants were 
less numerous, but its death list generally tallied with 
its arrival register; entering its domains was like bid- 
ding hope adieu and existence a long farewell. 

Some trap^ic scenes and sad events occurred to 
break the monotony of prison life. On the 8th day 
of July, 1864, six prisoners were hung for various 
crimes committed inside the prison — murdering, 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 13 

Stealing, etc. The trials were conducted by the pris- 
oners according to the forms of law. Twelve prisoners 
were selected as jurymen. The evidence was sent 
to General Sherman, who was then writing history 
on the walls of Atlanta. The evidence was returned 
with his approval. The gallows were erected inside 
the prison, near the south-side gate. The condemned 
ones were brought in from the stocks, where they 
had been kept for safe keeping, and delivered into 
the hands of the prisoners, who assisted them up the 
steps to the traps on the platform, and after deliver- 
ing brief dying declarations they were pinioned and 
bandaofed, and a moment later and another act in 
the cruel, sanguinary drama was finished. The 
prison authorities neither approved of nor prevented 
the proceedings. 

During the month of August there happened 
what the religiously inclined termed a providential 
dispensation. Being a lover of nature and the nat- 
ural, and believing that cause produces an effect, 
and every effect is produced or originates from some 
cause, I commenced the task of investigfation in order 
to arrive at the truth ; and during the above-named 
month and immediately after a heavy rain fall, a 
stream of pure, clear water flowed from the dead- 



14 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

line on the north side of the prison near the gate 
and emanating at the stockade, and after supplying 
our wants flowed down the hill in a southerly direc- 
tion to join the filthy stream that entered the stockade 
on the west. There was a large swamp or pond of 
water on the level north of the prison, fed by several 
springs, and its natural outlet was down the slope 
of the hill, where the Confederates, when building 
the stockade, excavated and widened to make a 
foundation track in which to place the stockade, and 
in doing so at the top of the hill obstructed the natural 
course of the stream by placing earth dug from the 
trench, thus impeding and forcing it to find its level 
and outlet in a more easterly direction. The heavy 
fall of rain caused it to break throug-h its artificial 
barrier, and obeying the laws of gravitation follow 
along the bed of the stockade to the slope of the hill, 
and rising to the surface was conducted through the 
dead-line and into the prison by means of wooden 
o-utters or troug^hs. 

Confinement or restraint of liberty is calculated to 
make one ill-tempered, cross-grained and snappish ; 
such being our case it did not require more than 
a close rub or a gentle tap to bring on a collision or 
an engagement; and while the participants seldom 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 15 

hurt each other, it would provoke a kind of a dry 
cornmeal laugh to hear the eye witnesses remark, 
"don't hit him with that pound cake," or "don't 
knock him down with that roast turkey," items that 
were strangers in the bill of fare at Andersonville. 
In different parts of the enclosure could be found 
Justices of the Peace, whose business it was to ad- 
minister justice and punish offenders of the peace. 
If a prisoner had stolen anything, the accused and 
accuser were brought face to face, witnesses were 
examined, the evidence condensed and the offender, 
if found guilty, would receive a certain number of 
lashes from a " cat o' nine tails," and in all cases the 
number of lashes and severity of them, would cor- 
respond with the gravity and nature of the offence 
committed ; and if the case was an aggravated one, 
he would, in addition to the lashes, have to run the 
gauntlet, which was a narrow path or space through 
the densely crowded street, along which he was 
compelled to pass, and if he arrived at the other end 
without receiving an occasional bat, he could credit 
it to his successful dodging and nodding propensities. 
Sometimes the Qrauntlet ceremonies would be dis- 
pensed with, and a more mild and quiet performance 
substituted and administered. One half of the head 



16 



COIvLECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



and beard would be shaved close to the skin, the 
Other half allowed to remain to make a prominent 
contrast; rather disfiguring the man, but generally 
harming nobody but his own looks and feelings. 




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LORENCE.— We were re- 
moved from Andersonville and 
landed at Florence during the 
month of September, 1864. 
Florence is a small town in 
Darlington district, South Car- 
olina, about one hundred miles 
northeast of Charleston. The 
prison was situated one mile from the town near a 
small rivulet, which ran through the prison and 
emptied into a swamp. The stockade was built 
after the style of the Andersonville one ; it contained 
an area of six acres, and its occupants numbered 
ten thousand. Instead of sentry boxes the earth 
was banked up to within a few feet of the top of the 
stockade, all the labor being performed by negroes, 
who, while at work, sang plantation songs, making 
their feet, pick or shovel keep time with the music 
of their sones. 

Our first keeper at this place was a kind-hearted, 
humane man — his name was Major Brown. He 



18 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

told US that any letters sent by us, or letters and 
Other articles sent to us would be taken care of as 
far as it was in his power to do so. This was the 
kindest treatment and the most sympathetic lan- 
guage that we received during our captivity, and his 
name is tenderly mentioned here, believing that to 
reward merit is one of the sweets of life, and honor- 
able mention should be made of an honorable man. 

He was succeeded by Col. Iverson, one whom 
the Confederate leaders considered more capable of 
converting their theories into practice. One of his 
first acts was the employing of a monster in the 
shape of a man named Lieutenant Davis, whose 
heart, if he had one, was as hard as adamant, and so 
contracted that it required one of Sherman's bullets 
to expand it, as he was afterward sent to help arrest 
that victorious General's march on Savannah, and 
placing himself in the right-of-way of a Union bullet 
experienced some of the pain which he helped inflict 
on others. 

We received one pint of meal each day. The 
quality was good, but the quantity insufficient. We 
received wood enough to cook it, which did not 
require very much. We had better water, the 
climate was not so warm, and in some respects our 



COIvlvECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 19 

condition was better than at Anderson vill.e ; but in 
Other respects we were made to feel our imprison- 
ment more bitterly. It was the winter season, our 
clothes had become worn and threadbare, and not 
having been washed for many months for the reason 
that they, like their possessors, were worn out and 
would not endure rouofh handling- much longer — 
somewhat of a contrast, when we consider that ours 
were past redemption in one year's time, while the 
raiments of the Jews in the wilderness '* waxed not 
old" in forty years, an event which may do to relate 
to any one who has not practically tested it. We 
made an attempt on one occasion to wash a shirt in 
the swamp without the aid of soap, which resulted in 
failure, and after an attempt to wring it, made the 
discovery that it was almost in two parts ; however, 
we made it stick together by half-soling it with an old 
ragf which we had the ofood fortune to find. "Neces- 
sity is the mother of invention," so we adopted the 
boiling process afterwards, by cooking our clothes in 
a two gallon tin bucket, which we purchased at 
Andersonville, and the only cooking utensil we had 
most of the time. Our rule was to cook our mush 
first, then boil our clothes and place them in the sun 
to dry, thus effectively disposing of the vermin. 



20 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



Our mess consisted of six comrades, and the ground 
allowed us was six feet square ; we enclosed it with 
mud walls about twenty inches high and twelve inches 
thick, with a small opening at one end, two by three 
feet, for ingress and egress ; the roof was twenty 
inches high at the sides, and three feet at the ridge 
pole or comb, and covered with parts of blankets and 
thatched piece to piece with wooden pins ; it pro- 
tected us somewhat from the sun, and broke the 
force of the rain and allowed it to fall on us in a 
sprinkled or sifted condition. We tried as well as 
we could to imitate civilization by erecting a chimney 
and fire place to help keep us warm and for cooking 
purposes ; we placed the old-fashioned stick of wood 
across to hang the mush bucket on, and very fre- 
quently when the cornmeal dumplings or mush was 
just ready to dish out. an unwelcome and unman- 
nerly chunk of brick or clay would obey the laws of 
gravitation and drop from the top of the chimney 
and find a resting place in our cooking pail; but we 
were taught by this time not to be too choice or 
fastidious about our manner of eating and style of 
cookine, and, after the sand had settled at the bottom, 
we satisfied our appetites as best we could under the 
circumstances. On one occasion we were compelled 



COLIvECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 21 

to do without rations for three days because we 
would not disclose the existence of a tunnel which 
nineteen-twentieths of us knew nothing about ; on 
the third day we received rations of black beans, 
which were noted for their age and holiness ; very 
few took time to cook them, but ate them quickly to 
satisfy intense hunger, the sound produced resem- 
blinof the crackinof often heard under acorn trees. 

Sometimes the prison authorities would break 
the monotony and have a little amusement at our 
expense by placing a tub of molasses in the center 
of the prison, and after advertising it, would with- 
draw the guards, leaving the flies and prisoners to 
decide the contest; and the result was, he who ven- 
tured for a handful generally got an armful, a head- 
ful or a pocketful. Many of both sexes from the 
surrounding district came to witness the perform- 
ances. On the outside near the officers' quarters 
were a half dozen or so half-grown .pines, to which 
prisoners were often tied up by the thumbs and 
forced to remain, their toes touchino^ the orround, for 
perhaps several hours at a time. 

Christmas day, 1864, was an eventful one, and 
known as Counting Day ; on one side of the run 
and swamp, which was connected with the larger 



22 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

space by a small wooden bridge, were quartered 
about one-third of the prisoners ; roll-call was of 
daily occurrence, but, for some reason known to 
the officers, they concluded to adopt another system 
of registering on this occasion ; orders were given for 
all to pass the guards and registers and go over the 
bridge where the one-third were quartered ; the 
numerous sick were carried or helped, the infirm 
and crippled hobbled as best they could. The pro- 
cess was slow on account of the many sick, and when 
all were over, packed in the small enclosure, we were 
about congratulating ourselves, when we were told 
to prepare to go through the same maneuvers again, 
as the count was not correct, or some mistake had 
been made, thus occupying the entire day. 

Many of the prisoners here died of swamp fever, 
and many died from hardships and fatigue on account 
of long imprisonment. But in one respect did 
Florence and jts commander eclipse Werts, of 
Andersonville. Orders were issued that all who 
would take the oath of alleofiance to the Southern 
Confederacy would be well taken care of and receive 
plenty to eat, and would be placed on home guard 
duty at Charlestown and Savannah; the prisoners 
formed in groups and discussed the programme ; it 



OCLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 23 

was a severe test ; it seemed that patriotism and 
existence were being weighed in the balance, with 
bright prospects of sure death cHnging to the former, 
and the desire for Hfe prompting the latter. Two 
hundred took the oath, not for love of the Confeder- 
ate cause, but simply to save life ; they were taken 
to Savannah, and in two weeks were returned to the 
stockade, as not being loyal enough In times of 
emergency ; they perhaps revered the oath, but they 
loved the flag whose birth was the morning s'tar of 
Liberty. 

Florence is thy name poetic ; 

There's another Florence, too, 
'Neath Italia's skies so sunny, 

One that poets love to view. 

Duringf the month of December a cartel of 
exchange was agreed upon, by which a specified 
number of the more weak and sickly ones were 
exchanged for an equal number held by the Union 
forces, and all who considered themselves belonging 
to that list were ordered in line ; various were the 
devices used to deceive the examining doctors ; 
some would drink an unusual amount of water, and, 
not being posted in the names and natures of such 



24 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

afflictions, would relate to the doctor how much they 
were troubled with the gout ; others would swallow 
tobacco and turn deadly pale ; others would become 
remarkably lame on short notice; some tied leather 
or cotton twine around their legs and arms to stop 
circulation of the blood and otherwise paralyze the 
limbs ; truthfully stated, we were all objects of pity 
without making fearfully bad ridiculously worse; 
but experience has taught us and history reminds us 
that man sometimes may dissemble, does magnify, 
and will use deception. 

We tried to escape on one occasion, but in this, 
as in other undertakings, failure crowned our efforts. 
Some things are uncertain, but we have fully decided 
never to be caught in that same "neck o' woods" 
again, and will relate it for the benefit of others who 
may be desirous of obtaining fame on bloody fields, 
and loathsome prisons. We had obtained privilege 
to visit a rail fence and get wood. Three of us 
touched the top rail and landed in a swamp on the 
other side, and, after paddling through it and over 
some rising ground, entered another swamp. We 
had scarcely secluded ourselves around the body of 
a large tree when we heard the report of the mus- 
ketry, and, the swamp being only about fifty feet wide. 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. '25 



could plainly see our less fortunate comrades picked 
up one by one ; this state of affairs was kept up from 
eight in the morning until about three o'clock in the 
afternoon; we then ventured to the borders of a 
friendly corn field, and getting a few ears, retreated 
to the swamp, and, after eating of the sweet, juicy 
corn, we patiently waited the advent of evening, dis- 
cussing in undertones the geography of our proposed 
route, the probabilities of escape, and the possibility 
of recapture. At eight o'clock we bade adieu to our 
swampy protector, and traveling through cane-break, 
cotton and corn fields, reached the Charleston and 
Wilmington Railroad. All was quiet, and no noise 
was heard save the song of the negroes returning 
from work at Florence, where they were helping 
build the stockade. We followed the railroad toward 
Wilmington, N. C, occasionally passing a stranger, 
whom we supposed would conclude we were slaves 
returning to the plantations. At this time we were 
making good headway, feeling in the best of spirits, 
and expecting in due time to enter the Union lines 
at or near Newburn, N. C. The moon was full, the 
night was clear; in the distance we noticed a train 
stop at a station; we held a council of war, and 
decided to make a flank movement to the left and 



26 COLI.ECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

again strike the railroad beyond the town. We 
passed several cotton mills on the outskirts, and 
striking a clay road leading toward the railroad, fol- 
lowed it, and accomplished the flank movement suc- 
cessfully. 

It was now about one o'clock in the morning. 
We halted, and tied together our already worn-out 
shoes. Listening, we heard sound resembling that 
often heard when chicken thieves are about. We 
concluded it was only some African, in search of a 
chicken for breakfast, and, stepping to the side of the 
track close to the embankment, which at this place 
was three feet high and overgrown with small pines, 
were quietly discussing the best method of crossing 
the Pee Dee River, when our conversation and our 
locomotion were brought to an abrupt termination 
by the word "Halt," and looking down the muzzles of 
three double-barreled shot guns seemed to give the 
word a little extra meaning and a double emphasis. 
We had no alternative but surrender. We tried to 
imitate the negroes by telling our captors that we 
were "gwine up de country," but perhaps we did 
not use the proper accent in the African dialect, and 
received an answer that it would be healthier for us 
to "go down the river." 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 27 

One of our captors was an elderly looking gentle- 
man, wore a standing collar, and assumed some- 
what of an aristocratic air; we addressed him and 
explained that our boarding arrangements had not 
been good of late, and hinted that a good square 
meal would be acceptable ; we were told to about- 
face, and on our arrival in town would receive rations. 
Arriving in the town, we were placed under guard, 
and received about a peck of onions which had been 
cultivated for seed and the long tops cut off. Variety 
is the spice of life ; our last meal was green corn, 
this one dried onions. It was two o'clock in the 
morning. Were now placed in another building 
more secure, but also more comfortable, and allowed 
to go in pairs, under guard, to the sweet potato 
patch which surrounded the building. Armed with 
a plantation hoe and an old four gallon soap kettle 
we soon made a vacuum in the patch; brim full we 
placed it on the fire, and in a short space of time 
done ample justice to ourselves, this being the first 
time for many months that we had a chance to do so. 
We gave a negro lad some Georgia scrip to get us a 
supply of red peppers — something that commanded 
a premium In prison on account of the scarcity of salt. 



28 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

We were now ordered to march back, under 
guard, to the prison pen, distance ten miles. It was 
Sunday morning, and the authorities, being pious, 
devout men, would not allow trains to run, so we 
were compelled to go on foot-back. We received 
permission to take the tin roof off a freight car which 
had been thrown off the track and wrecked; and it 
would be within the limits of truth to say that it was 
taken off in a shorter period of time than it took to 
place it there when new. Tin was a valuable article 
on account of the scarcity of cooking utensils. We 
were landed at the prison that evening, and, after 
answering some questions, received a pressing invi- 
tation to enter the confines of the stockade. We 
had been Out about forty hours, and our reward was 
a little liberty, a quantity of tin, a good mess of 
sweet potatoes, and a stock of red peppers. 

As related before, our mud-walled domicile had 
the capacity for five, but one of our comrades who 
had been in the hospital outside, escaped and was 
captured on the Atlantic coast and sent here for safe 
keeping, the claims were all taken up, and he 
accepted an invitation to abide with us. Our sleep- 
ing arrangements were somewhat contracted, and we 
were compelled to adopt the spoon system, any one 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 29 

wishing to turn would awake the others and all turn. 
Our bed was the earth, and our bedding whatever 
weeds and dried grass we could get ; we dug a well 
in front of our mansion. Our tools were of a rude 
and primitive nature, knives, parts of canteens, and 
a railroad spike. We had dug the well on our 
arrival here, and afterwards the prison authorities 
divided the enclosure into districts, separated by- 
narrow streets or alleys, and this arrangement left 
our well in the center of and almost wholly occupying 
the entire width of the alley. It was about ten feet 
in depth and uncovered, and almost every hour, 
especially during the night time, some one of the 
many prisoners would either slide in, walk in, or 
fall in They were generally more frightened than 
hurt, as the water was never more than a few inches 
deep. As we were sleeping a few feet distant, the 
sound produced resembled that of an explosion. 

We were removed from this place on the 
approach of Sherman's army, which at this time was 
advancing from Georgia and through the Carolinas, 
and taken to Wilmington, N. C. Here, also, the 
Confederates were in trouble ; Fort Fisher had been 
captured, and the Union forces were marching up 
the Cape Fear and demanding admission into Wil- 



30 COIvIvECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



minpfton. We were taken to Goldsboro, distance 
eighty-five miles, and marched into the woods, and 
three days afterwards paroled — sworn not to take 
up arms against the Confederate government during 
the space of ninety days ; something which we knew 
we would not be required to do according to the 
laws and usages of war. We were loaded once 
more on freight cars, and told that we would be 
landed at Wilmington next day. We went south 
across the bridge that spans the Neuse, and early 
next morning the train, decorated with white flags of 
truce, approached the Union picket line ; the train 
moved cautiously and slow, the Commissioners of 
Exchange met and accepted and signed the final 
documents, and as fast as could be counted entered 
the Union lines, after an imprisonment of eleven 
long, fearfully long, months of weary confinement. 
The sun was obscured by clouds and fog ; when we 
inquired the time of day, we were answered half- 
past eight in the morning ; completely surprising us, 
we supposing it was five o'clock in the evening. 
Such is suspense, terrible suspense that we experi- 
enced on that eventful morning, caused by delays, 
uncertainty and doubt in attesting and signing the 
necessary papers. We bade farewell to our cooking 



COI^LECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 31 



Utensils, and remembered them on account of their 
age and usefulness in the past. 

We marched to the north-east branch of the 
Cape Fear, and were kindly received by Schofield's 
army, whose bands played "Home, Sweet Home," 
which seemed to infuse new life into our bodies and 
nerves, and led us to hope that in the near future we 
would have new clothes also, and soon be permitted 
to once more view the green fields of Pennsylvania, 

After receiving a supply of crackers and tobacco 
we marched to Wilmington and remained there one 
week waiting for an escort to accompany our steam- 
ers and transports to Annapolis, Maryland ; the 
Confederate privateers were hovering around the 
coast, and an escort of iron-clads was necessary for 
safety. 

We were quartered in the railroad buildings and 
received all the rations we could wish for or desire. 

One thing remarkable occurred here ; we could 
not sleep neither by day or night during the seven 
days that we remained here ; the doctors told us the 
cause of it was drinking large quantities of strong 
coffee, which so excited our nerves that sleep or 
slumber was impossible until our nervous system 
ceased to be effected by the stimulant. From this 



32 COLIvECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

place we were taken down the Cape Fear, along the 
Atlantic coast into the Chesapeake at Cape Henry, 
up the Chesapeake to Annapolis, and after receiving 
new uniforms entered Camp Parole, and a few days 
afterwards received sixty day furloughs and took 
trains on different routes for home. We will add 
another item in regard to the manner of keeping 
and observing time in prison ; guard No. i would 
cry aloud, " Corporal of the guard, post No. i, nine 
o'clock and all's right," which would be repeated by 
each guard with the number of the post, until it 
came around to the place of beginning, the word 
"all" receiving an extra amount of emphasis, and 
while food was scarce we received time every hour. 
During the exciting political campaign in the 
year 1864, when the northern states were voting for 
Lincoln and McClellan, the Confederates, wishing 
to satisfy their curiosity, and test the political pref- 
erence of the prisoners, placed two sacks of beans, 
one black, the other white, inside the dead line, and 
wished us to vote for our choice ; black beans to be 
cast for Lincoln and white ones for McClellan. It 
was a primitive way of voting, with economy as a 
factor, as next day we were fed with the same 
beans. The inspectors, instead of counting, meas- 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 33 



ured the ballots by the (^iiart to economize time and 
figures. As many of us were youno-, It was our 
first vote as American citizens ; eatino- the ballots 
may have inculcated the political appetite for the 
future interest we have since exhibited in ballot 
boxes. 

Much more could be written and told of the pri- 
vations, the sufferings and distress ; much could be 
said of the unmerciful, inhuman and hard-hearted 
Werts, who left his liberty-loving- Switzerland to 
help establish slavery in another hemisphere. Much 
could be related of the terrors of the dead line, and 
the deadly bullets of the sentry ; and the cemetery 
with its fourteen thousand occupants ; the dismal 
dead house, the howling blood hounds, the squeak- 
ing of the prison gates opening to receive the un- 
fortunates, thej>atde of the ball and chain, the 
stocks, the morning roll-call, the noon-day sun, and 
the mid-night storm ; wrecked constitutions and de- 
ranged minds, bright intellects, whose morning sun 
went down at noon. We say that much more could 
be written, but it is already recorded in history, 
and liberal minded readers of a more liberal and 
advanced age than ours, may perhaps be more char- 
itable, and after reading the cause of our civil con- 



34 COIvLECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

rtict, our customs, manners, and teachino-s, assign us 
a place in history that may not be in keeping with 
our boasted civiHzation in this evening of the nine- 
teenth century, and may say that we hved in a half- 
civiHzed age, when reason was compelled to remain 
silent and unable to stay the bitter animosity insti- 
gated and inflamed by leaders of the North and 
the South ; that prejudice and passion ruled when 
reason, arbitration and compromise should have de- 
cided, and bloody warfare been avoided ; they may 
perhaps refer to the Czar of Russia, who by a stroke 
of the pen liberated the millions of serfs of his do- 
minions. The South wished to perpetuate slavery, 
claiming that it was protected by the Constitution, 
and practiced and trafficked in by the ancient patri- 
archs, the chosen people of old ; the North claimed 
it was morally, religiously and politically wrong, and 
sent cohorts of soldiers and scores of chaplains to 
enforce its decree, and inform posterity that the re- 
lics of barbarism would not be tolerated in a land 
dedicated to the Goddess of Liberty — to freedom 
and liberty — that liberty which has made our land 
the envy and pride of other lands. History may re- 
fer us to Geneva, where arbitration superceded the 
sword, and a costly warfare with the British Isles 



COIvLECTIONvS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 35 

avoided, and silendy yet forcibly remind us that 
" Peace hath her victories not less renowned than 
war." And "with malice toward none and charity 
for all," let us nail the lid on the coffin with the con- 
tents of the past, its gory battle-fields, its loathsome 
prisons, its sorrows and sufferings, and deposit it 
in the cemetery of forgetfulness, and let there be 
inscribed on its epitaph in characters plain, and In 
letters and language imperishable and bold : War 
is destructive of human happiness. 

As to who was responsible for this gloomy pic- 
ture of our civil war, let posterity and the iron pen 
of history decide, as a verdict now, while many of 
the actors survive, would not. be accepted as impar- 
tial. It such could be the case we would charge it 
up to the debit side of the Confederate ledger own- 
ed by Jefferson Davis and his cabinet only ; for the 
masses of the South we would say, " not guilty." 
Was it caused by choice or necessity, let the reports 
on file in the War Department relating to provisions 
found and captured by Sherman and his generals, 
and the abundant supply of woodland surrounding 
the stockades answer. The reader can form his 
own opinion and give a verdict as to the intent and 
meaning of the following order, issued by Brigadier 



m COLLECTIONS OF A COKFEK COOLER. 



General John H. Winder in regard to opening fire 

on the prisoners should the victorious Sherman 

threaten or dare to Uberate the prisoners: 

Headquarters Military Prison, ) 

Andersonville, Ga., Jul3^ 27, 1864. \ 
The officers on duty and in charge of the battery of 
Florida artillery at the time will, upon receiving notice 
that the enemy has approached within seven miles of this 
post, open upon the stockade with grapeshot, without refer- 
ence to the situation beyond the lines of defense. 

John H. Winder, 
Brigadier-General Commanding. 

Who was responsible for this order? Subordin- 
ates seldom assume liberty to issue orders of like 
import and meaning without instructions from supe- 
riors. Was it dictated by Messrs. Winder and 
Wertz, or did the authority emanate from the Con- 
federate capitol ? In military parlance its terror and 
tone would indicate origin above and beyond that 
of a brigadier or commander of a military post. 
This republic, as the party of the first part, holds a 
first bond and mortgage on Sumpter county, Geor- 
gia, and the recital of that obligation should read, 
that for a valuable and costly consideration, the 
county of Sumpter, in the State of Georgia, shall 
and will henceforth and forever retain our dead, who 
sleep on her soil, and they shall rest in honored 
graves under the folds of one flag, the flag of the 
republic. 



Transformed Historic Scenes. 



ANDERSONVIIvI.E IN 1889. 




URNING the finger on the dial 
face of Time forward to the 
quarter century mark leaves 
us on the transformed his- 
toric spot, with its changed 
aspect, and its vivid reminder 
of the scenes enacted during- 
the drama of Civil War — 
twenty- five years ago. 
We arrived at Andersonville during the month 
of September, 1889. The town consists of eight or 
ten dwellings, and one hotel. We hired a colored 
guide, who escorted us to the old prison inclosure. 
The ground is now owned b)- two negroes, and a 
cotton crop now covers its once repulsive surface; 
all the evidence of imprisonment once used by the 
Confederate military authorities have ceased to exist, 
save a small shed over the once famous spring, that 
many claimed had supernatural origin. The stock- 



38 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

acle is all down, nothing to define the once ponderous 
inclosure, except that the stumps of the logs, and 
the outlines of the prison are well traced and defined 
by the old water wells, dug by the Union prisoners. 
There are no remains of the Confederate cookhouse, 
dead-house, or Captain Wertz's headquarters ; only 
the unleveled remains of the earthen breastworks, 
from which Commander Wertz used to point sections 
of artillery, loaded with grape and canister, to awe 
and intimidate the prisoners who. dared to sing- 
patriotic songs within range of the guns. The low 
ground or swamp lying between the north and south 
sides of the prison is now grown over with canebrake 
and brushwood ; this was the locality so uninviting 
and repulsive while occupied by the prisoners. In 
other parts of the prison inclosure are trees twelve 
to fifteen inches in diameter, of the pine and per- 
simmon variety. Time, with its mellowing influ- 
ences, is tenderly weaving and quietly placing the 
cover of forgetfulness on these tragic scenes of other 
days. The cemetery, a short distance from the old 
prison pen, is maintained by the Government. Capt. 
Bryant, the superintendent, was a Union soldier, and 
the visitor is made to feel at home, notwithstanding 
the melancholy memories that surround him. The 



.COI.LECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 39 



Hao- now waves over one livingr and fourteen thou- 
sand dead. The known graves number 12,779, and 
the unknown number is 923. The unknown have a 
square marble head-stone with the sohtary number 
in figures on its face ; the known have the soldier's 
name, number and State, and a look at the register 
in the superintendent's office tells you the company 
and regiment. The cemetery is inclosed with a 
durable red brick wall five feet high and eighteen 
inches in thickness. The six prisoners who ended 
their captivity here on the gallows, during the year 
1864, and were executed by the [)risoners for mur- 
dering their fellow prisoners, have their head-stones 
marked "Raiders," with their names and States. 
Their names are thus inscribed: P. Delaney and W. 
Collins, of Pennsylvania; Charles Curtis, of Rhode 
Island; John Sarsfield, of New York ; W. Dickson 
and A. Munn. both of the United States Navy. The 
crimes for which they suffered were desperate, and 
desperate cases required desperate remedies. The 
old water wells dug by the prisoners still remain 
unfilled, many of them now being covered over with 
posts and logs. 

Florence, S. C, was next visited. The stockade 
here, like the one at Andersonville, is rapidly dis- 



40 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



appearing and decaying under die relendess hand of 
Time. The earthen embankment along the outside 
of the wooden stockade, on which the Confederate 
sentinel paced to and fro and hourly shouted the 
time of night, is all that now remains of the obstacle 
to freedom where ten thousand prisoners suffered 
during the weary and dreary months of the wmter of 
] 864. The Government has also a cemetery here. 
It, like the one at Andersonville,, is inclosed by a 
red brick wall, and a macadamized roadway, one 
mile in length, is now under construction, and will 
connect the town of Florence with the cemetery. 
William J. Elgie, a one-armed soldier, is superin- 
tendent here, and will kindly assist the visitor as he 
views the small patch of cotton and the shrub trees 
in the old prison inclosure, and with index finger 
point out the marble head-stones, on 2,799 of which 
you will find the melancholy word " Unknown," and 
206 only the name. State and number ; and in this 
four acre bivouac of the dead you will find one head- 
stone with this inscription; " Florena Budwin, born 
in Philadelphia, 21 years of age." The records state 
that she was the wife of Captain Budwin, who was 
killed by one of the guards at Andersonville, Ga., 
and from that place sent with the other male prison- 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 41 

ers to Florence. She enlisted as a soldier in dis- 
guise, and. with love for husband and devotion to 
country, shared the sad fortunes of war, which cruelly 
severed her affections, her sex remaining unknown 
until death revealed the well-kept secret, and left her 
loyalty and devotion inscribed on monumental marble 
— perhaps less durable than the causes that prompted 
her to alone take the vanguard when the flag that 
now waves over her called for defenders. We leave 
her romantic and "windowless palace" musing, 
"The thoughts of war overpower all others." 

The object of our visit to these old prison pens 
was in part to find the last resting place of a comrade 
and brother who died here durine the war. We 
failed to find a record of him amone the known, 
leaving Fame to say of one and all : 

"Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead, 

Dear as the blood ye gave ; 
No impibus footstep here shall tread 

The herbage of your grave. 
Nor shall your glor)- be forgot 

While Fame her record keeps. 
Or Honor points the hallowed spot 

Where valor proudh' sleeps." 



42 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



In the middle of the cemetery is a mound four 
feet high, from which arises a flag-pole, at the top of 
which the United States flag proudly waves from 
sunrise to sunset; to the south of it a few feet you 
will observe two cannons standine with their mute 
mouths pointing heavenward, balls being laid upon 
them to signify their peaceful mission — looking from 
the silent graves to the silent spheres — from the 
once wild music of war to the now calm serenity of 
death. 




FORAGING 



Bv S. Creklman. 




OT a shot was heard, nor 
the tap of a drum, 
As the porker we 
took was borrowed ; 
No farewell crack 
from the owner's 
shot-o^un, 
But a siMi and look of deep sorrow. 



We covered him over with our army blouse. 
As the night being cold affected his liver; 

And we hastened to leave the old farmer's house 
On the banks of the Tennessee river. 

We husded him lively on that lonely night, 
With his bristles for a shroud around him ; 

Wondering if the rest we left in the nest 
Would meet his sad fate in the morning. 



44 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 




Little they'll think of the risk they run 

When they wake up for corn on the morrow, 

As we meant to take them, every last one, 
But we found them too heavy to carry. 

We landed him safely in the dead of night, 
Not a cookoo or whooperwill singing ; 

And with moonshine alone for a signal light, 
To the camp we determined to bring him. 

Slowly and sadly we laid him down. 
Waiting to quarter and scrape him ; 

And we slept like warriors on the camp ground 
Until the hour of one in the mornino-. 



COLLECTIONvS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



45 



Not a prayer was said with the funeral rites, 
As his bones over the ramparts we lowered, 

In the dead of night, when the miisquito bites 
And gets in full time with his borer. 

We dreamed of the time when soldiering was done, 
And pigs could eat corn unmolested; 

And with tearful fun about the porker's last run. 
When — the General had us arrested. 




yTfrs./'MDro-tne CO- 



THE SOLDIER'S WIDOW. 



Bv Frank Cr.ivK. 




ELL, no, my wife 
ain't dead, sir. 

Hut I've lost her 
all the same ; 
She left me volun- 
tarily. 

But neither was 

to blame ; 
It's rather a queer story. 

And I think you will agree, 

When you hear the circumstances, 

'Twas rather rouQ^h on me. 

She was a soldier's widow, 

He was killed on Malvern Hill, 
And when I married her 

She seemed to sorrow for him still. 
But I brouofht her here to Kansas, 

And I never want to see 
A better wife than Mary was 

For .five bright years to me. 



COIvLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

The change of scene brought cheerfulness, 

And such a rosy glow 
Of happiness warmed Mary's cheeks 

And melted all the snow. 
I think she loved me some, 

I'm bound to think that of her, sir; 
And as for me, I can't begin to tell 

How dearly I loved her. 

Three )'ears ago the baby came 

Our humble home to bless, 
And then I reckon I was nigh 

To perfect happiness. 
'Twas her's, 'twas mine, 

But I've no language to express to you 
How that little orirl's weak finoers 

Our hearts together drew. 

Once we watched it through a fever. 
And with each gasping breath, 

Dumb with an awful, worldly woe, 
We waited for its death ; 

And, though I'm not a pious man. 
Our hearts together there 

For Heaven to save our darling- 
Went up in voiceless prayer. 



48 



COIvIvECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



And when the doctor said 'twould Hve, 

Our joy, what words could tell, 
Clasped in each other's arms 

Our grateful tears together fell. 
Sometimes you see the shadows 

Fall across our little nest, 
l)iit It only made the sunshine seem 

A doubly welcome guest. 

Work came to me a plenty, 

And I kept the anvil ringing, 
Early and late you'd find me there, 

A hammering and singing. 
Love nerved my arm to labor 

And moved my tongue to song, 
And though my singing wasn't sweet, 

It was almighty strong. 




\ Pni-sPHoro-ENd-Co 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 49 

One day a one-armed soldier 

Came to have me nail a shoe, 
And while I was at work 

We passed a compliment or two. 
I asked him where he lost his arm ; 

He said 'twas shot away 
At Malvern Hill— " At Malvern Hill?" 

" Did you know Robert May? " 

" That's me," said he. " You, you," cried I, 

Shouting with horrid doubt, 
If you're a man, just follow me, 

We'll solve this mystery out. 
With dizzy step and aching heart 

I led him to Mary — alas, 'twas true. 
Then the bitterest pangs of misery 

Unspeakable I knew. 

Frozen with deadly horror. 

She stared with eyes of stone, 
And from her wild and quivering lips 

Went one despairing moan. 
'Twas he, the husband of her youth, 

Now risen from the dead ; 
But all too late. 

And with one bitter cry her senses fled. 



50 COLIvECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



What could be done; on his return 
He sought in vain some tidings of 

His absent wife to learn. 

'Twas well that he was innocent, 

Else I'd have killed him, too, 

So dead he never would have rose 

Till Gabriel's trumpet blew. 

It was agreed between us 

That Mary should decide, 
And each by her decision 

Would sacredly abide, 
No sinner at the judgment seat, 

Waiting eternal doom 
Could suffer what I did 

While waiting sentence in that room. 

Rigid and breathless there we stood, 

With nerves as tense as steel. 
While Mary looked on each white face 

In piteous appeal. 
Oh! could not woman's duty 

Be less hardly reconciled 
Between her lawful husband 

And the father of her child ? 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. ol 



Ah, how my heart was chilled to ice 

When she knelt down and said, 
Forgive me, John, he is my husband ; 

Here, alive, not dead. 
I raised her tenderly 

And tried to tell her she was right, 
But somehow in my achino- breast 

The pinioned words stuck tight. 

"But, John, I can't leave baby," 

What ! Wife and child, cried I. 
Oh, cruel, cruel fate. 

Better that I should die. 
Think of the sad and lonely hours 

Waiting in gloom for me ; 
No wife to cheer me with her love, 

No babe to climb my knee. 

And yet you are her mother, 

And the mother's sacred love 
Is sdll the purest, tenderest tie 

That nature ever wove. 
Take her, but promise, Mary, 

For that will bring no shame, 
My litde girl shall learn to speak 

And lisp her father's name. 



I 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



It may be in the life to come 

I'll meet my child and wife, 
But yonder by my cottage gate 

We parted for this life. 
(3ne long hand-clasp from Mary 

And my dream of love was done ; 
One long embrace from baby, 

And my happiness was gone. 




ARMY BEANS 



Bv Capt. a. L/Aufman. 



Tune — " Swei t Bye and Bye." 




HERE'S a plant that 
grows out ot the soil, 

Not a rose or a shrub 
do I mean ; 

'Twas sown by the poor 
sons of toil, 

And was known as 
the white army bean. 

Chorus — 

'Tis the bean that we mean. 

That we ate in the old days of yore. 

Little beans without greens. 

That we ate on the James River shore. 



54 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

The hard-tack and salt pork we've eat, 
And sea-horse from out the far west, 

In the bonds of a Union all meat, 

Still we like the small white bean the best. 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 

There's a spot that the soldier loved dear, 
The mess tent's the old place I mean, 

And the grub that we used to eat there 
Was our old friend the white army bean. 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 

When the drear nights of winter came grim, 
And the camp-fires gleamed on the scene, 

Then the mess kettle filled to the brim 
With salt pork and little white beans, 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 

On the bright glowing coals it would sit. 
When the daylight had fled from the scene, 

And boil till the darkness had flit, 

And had softened the hard-hearted bean. 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



In the camps on the James River shore, 
On the march to the South do I mean, 

When we'd turkey and hard-tack no more 
We fell back on the white army bean. 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 

We'll have beans in the sweet bye-and-bye. 
We'll have pork that you always find 

With roast beans and bean-soup and pie 
Made with beans of the old-fashioned kind. 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 

We have mince-pie and pound cake at home. 

And forofet all about the mule team ; 
But we always will weep and bemoan 

The loss of the white army bean. 

Chorus — 'Tis the bean, etc. 






THE SOLDIER'S FUNERAL. 



By Caroline E. Norton. 




ARK to the shrill trumpet 
callinof, 

It pierces the soft sum- 
mer air ; 

Tears from each comrade 
are falling, 

For the widow and or- 
phan are there. 

The bayonets earthward 
are turning, 
And the drum's muffled breath rolls around ; 
But he heeds not the voice of their mourning, 
Or awakes to the bugle sound. 

Sleep, soldier, tho' many regret thee 
Who stand by thy cold bier to-day ; 

Soon, soon shall the kindest forget thee. 
And thy name from the earth pass away. 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



The man thou did'st love as a brother 
A friend in thy place will have gained ; 

Thy dog will keep watch for another, 
Thy steed by a stranger be reined. 

Tho' the hearts that now beat for thee sadly 

Soon joyous as ever shall be, 
Tho' thy bright orphan boy may laugh gladly 

As he sits on some kind comrade's knee, 

There is one who will still pay the duty 
Of tears for the true and the brave, 

As when first in the bloom of her beauty 
She wept o'er the soldier's grave. 




SILEiNT SENTINELS 



By S. CREEI.MAN. 




OUNTAINS are na- 
ture's sentinels. 

Reviewing the ages as 
they pass 

In grrand review, in 
every clime, 

Moving- in silence like 
the spheres, 

Majestic and sublime. 



From Northland's frigid halls of ice, 
To lands beyond the Southern sun ; 
When nature in her time ofave birth 
To land and sea on planet earth, 
From pole to pole. 

From Himalaya's ariel height, 
From Chimborazo's craggy peaks. 
Clad in their uniforms of snow. 
Unchanging as the ocean's ebb fiow. 
Forever and forever. 



COIvLECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



59 



In endless age and nightless day, 
Guarding widi undisputed sway 
One planet and two hemispheres, 
Saluting clouds for countless years, 
Sentinels of Time. 




ARMY CORiN. 

Rv S. Creelman. 

SOLDIER had a full grown corn 
On the top of his little toe, 

And every place the soldier went 
The corn was sure to oro. 

It went with him to the picket line. 
And it went with him for rations. 

And many a kick the boys did get, 
And once in a while a thrashino-. 

o 

And so the soldier turned him out 

Of a hole in the army shoe, 
And swore he'd kill the first son of a gun 

That would tramp on — the Red, White and Blue. 

It went with him to the surgeon's tent 

To get a little corn-ation. 
When the doctor jerked it out of root 

He yelled like thunderation. 



60 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



And so the doctor turned him out. 

As it was against the army rules 
To have a soldier pray and shout 

When driving- government mules. 



THE BATTLE-FIELD. 

Anon. 

Dedicated to the First Minnesota Inf., whose loss of 83 per cent, at Gettysburg, July 3d, 
1863, is unparalleled in history. 





HEN at last the victim fired. 

And work of blood had end ; 
And twinkling gray had passed 
away. 

And morpheus night descend. 

Oh ! what shouts of pain and hollow moans 

With terrors rent the air ; 
Expiring warriors' dying groans. 

x^nd all the agonizing tones of heroes in despair. 



THE ARMY MULE. 



Bv S. CreeIvMAN. 



Had there been no mule there would have been 
no war; the fact is the army mule in war is as 
requisite as the army musket, both having good 
kicking qualities, and when actively engaged have 
been known to create desolation and woe. Of the 
two, perhaps, the mule is the most to be dreaded, as 
with his ears laid back, and his rear understandings 
horizontally inclined, he stands as the signal of 
dano-er; not so with the simple, innocent musket, 
with its damaged powder and defective cap. It is 
the well fed and fully developed, long-eared army 
mule with the galvanic battery attached to the two 
rear shoes that requires eternal vigilance ; and on 
more than one occasion has proper credit been 
denied the mule for conspicuous actions, not only in 
batde or in the wagon train, but in peaceful camp. 
Many devout teamsters and piously inclined soldiers 
have broken pledges made in childhood days by 
coming in contact and being on too intimate terms 



62 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



with the army mule. He is also noted for his 
economical habits. He never wastes his amunition, 
or, in other words, he never kicks unless there is 
absolute necessity for kicking; and when he does 
let fly, like the hornet, he seldom makes a mistake, 
but hits the mark. Another commendable trait of 
the army mule is, he is quiet and unassuming. In 
times of danger his winkers are generally open, 
but he says nothing ; and instances have been known 
where he received a thrashing intended for another, 
all without the use of his veto power, and patiently 
awaiting a time to have revenge. The fact is, the 
mule was born for war, as it were; a patent self-act- 
ing howitzer, and by reversing himself could use his 
driving wheels as a single or double header. He 
was noted for consistency, the same yesterday, 
to-day and the day before ; and only a few instances 
are recorded of the army mule dying, and then only 
as his last act and deed. In number of days he re- 
sembles the eagle by renewing his youth, and nearly 
always turns up in the next campaign right side up 
with care. Yes, sir, the mule was put together for 
war purposes, and I repeat, without the mule there 
could have been no war ; he is generally useful when 
army supplies have to change base ; he also hauls 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



63 



the rations, he hauls the camp riggings, and some- 
times he hauls off with his weapons of defense when 
a former injury calls for revenge. The army mule 
has been known as a songster. His modus operandi 
is different from that of the nio^htino-ale, but when 
given to the world comes direct from his lungs. 
Another almost foro-otten trait of the mule is his 
good looks. In taking his photo always take a front 
view. Several sudden deaths have been noted by 
disregarding this advice. Take his ears first, place 
a pair of innocent looking eyes about eighteen inches 
below the tip of each lug, and beneath his beaming 
cheeks leave an opening for his fog-horn or feed- 
box. If your glass is now in good condition we 
would advise you to retire and complete the other 
part after you shall have made your last will and 
named a couple of executors. I repeat, with all due 
reverence for the rest of the long-eared tribe, that 
without the mule there could have been no war. 




CO. K. 



From the New Bedford, Pa., Mercury. 




HERE'S a cap in the closet, 

Old, tattered and blue. 
Of very slight value 

It may be to you ; 
But a crown, jewel studded. 

Could not buy it to-day, 
With its letters of honor, 

Brave "Co, K." 



The head that it sheltered 

Needs shelter no more ; 
Dead heroes make holy 

The trifles they wore ; 
So like chaplet of honor, 

Of laurel and bay 
Seems the cap of the soldier 

Marked "Co. K." 



COLIvKCTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 65 

Bright eyes have looked cahnly 

Its visor beneath 
O'er the work of the Reaper, 

Grim Harvester Death ! 
Let the muster roll, meager, 

So mournfully say, 
How foremost in danger 

Went "Co. K." 

Whose footsteps unbroken 

Came up to the town. 
Where rampart and bastion 

Looked threateningly down. 
Who, closing up breaches. 

Still kept on their way, 
Till guns, downward pointed, 

Face "Co. K." 

Who faltered or shivered ? 

Who shunned battle stroke ? 
Whose fire was uncertain ? 

Whose battle line broke ? 
Go, ask it of history 

Years from to-day. 
And the record shall tell you 

Not "Co. K." 



66 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

Though my darHng is sleeping 

To-day with the dead, 
And daisies and clover 

Bloom over his head, 
I smile through my tears 

As I lay. it away — 
That battle-worn cap 

Lettered " Co. K." 



DIXIES SUNNY LAND 



By Comrade Lauffer. 



Air — " Some Twenty Years Ago." 

Come friend and fellow soldier brave, 

Come listen to our song 
About the rebel prisons and 

Our sojourn there so long. 
Our wretched state and hardships great 

No one can understand 
But those who have endured this fate 

In Dixie's sunny land. 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



When captured by the "chivalry" 

They stripped us to the skin, 
But tailed to give us back again 

The value of a pin, 
Except some lousy rags of gray 

Discarded by their band. 
And thus commenced our prison life 

In Dixie's sunny land. 

This was our daily bill of fare 

In that secesh saloon. 
No sugar, tea or coffee there 

At morning, night or noon ; 
But a pint of meal ground cob and all 

Was served to every man, 
And for want of fire we ate it raw 

In Dixie's sunny land. 

We were by these poor rations soon 

Reduced to skin and bones ; 
A lingering starvation, worse 

Than death, we could but own. 
There hundreds lay both night and day 

By far too weak to stand, 
Till death relieved their sufferings 

In Dixie's sunny land. 



68 



COLIyECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



We poor survivors oft were tried 

By many a threat and bribe 
To desert our glorious Union cause 

And join the rebel tribe ; 
Though fain were we to leave the place, 

We let them understand 
We'd rather die than thus disgrace 

Our flao- in Dixie's land. 



SOLDIER'S ORATION. 



Bv CapT. a. Laufman. 



[That was to have been delivered at Boston, July 4th.] 

Mr. Editor, Citizens of Boston, South Commons, and 

Bunker Hill District: 

I take my pen in hand to let you know that I am 
well, and hope these few lines will find you enjoying 
the same state of health, etc., etc. And, further, I 
wish to inform you that in anticipation of the cele- 
bration of the Fourth of July by the citizens at Bos- 
ton town, I had prepared my little address for that 
occasion, thinking that perhaps I might be called 
upon by some enthusiastic individual to say a few 
words at that tremendous outpouring of oratory. 
As no place could be found large enough for the 
jubilee, it had to be abandoned, and, where are we 
now? Is it right, Mr. Editor, and people of the out- 
lying districts, that all the beauty, pathos and putty 
contained in these undelivered orations should be 
lost to posterity? I think not. Posterity expects a 
legacy of Fourth of July orations that will glitter in 



70 COLIyECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

the nation's diadem, and illuminate the land from the 
rock-bound coasts of Maine to where calm Pacific's 
waters lave the golden sands of California. (Leave 




room here for cheers and groans.) If this neglect 
is allowed to prevail, the all-absorbing topic of Free- 
dom will become a thing of the past ; the Fourth will 
die and be buried in the dead past along with the 



COLIvECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 



third and fifth, and then who can tell the difference? — 
not much. Excuse me, I drift — yes, drift with the 
tide of human sentiment back to the time when the 
Bay State guards dumped King George's tea into 
Boston harbor, in the disguise of Indians. I mean 
the guard, not the tea. Boston was not disguised as 
an Indian either. I don't want to make any mistakes 
or erroneous impressions, as this may pass into his- 
tory a hundred years from now, and be found stick- 
ing in the archives of the Capitol. So you see the 
necessity of accuracy. 'Tis well known that when 
Columbia, like the Roman mother, is asked to dis- 
play her jewels, she proudly points to the Fourth of 
July as the brightest and biggest, in fact I might say 
the larorest of the whole caboodle of cobble stones 
that deck the nation's shirt collar. The reasons, my 
dear children, for this day being sacred to the people 
of this ^country, are as follows, to-wit: On that day, 
more than a century ago, our four-fathers (I think 
there were four) decided to leave the old man's work- 
shop and start business for themselves. Of course 
the old man grumbled at first, but after a few years 
unpleasantness, and a few men killed, and the loss 
of a dozen boxes or so of Oolong and Japan, he gave 
up, and allowed the thirteen boys to go to house- 



72 COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 

keeping for themselves ; so they fished out the tea and 
set up the cook-stove, and have since adopted several 
orphans from the western district, and now have a 
big wigwam at Washington, and an Indian training 
school at West Point. And now, children, I want 
you to be careful of who you entertain. The country 
is full of old veterans who would lay down their lives 
to establish this Fourth of July business ; you can see 
them on every street corner with a wooden leg and 
an old accordeon, and the music they make is so en- 
trancing that you wish you had never been born, or 
if born, only lived a few hours. When I was a boy 
one of these old soldiers used to come around every 
summer. (I often wondered where he spent the 
winter.) And on rainy days would lie on the hay 
in the old barn and listen to his blood-curdling tales. 
This connecting link between the past and the pres- 
ent, as he called himself, would tell of the glories of 
the revolution, and how sweet it was to die for one's 
country. I never could see where the sweet came 
in. We listened to him all day, and dreamed of him 
all nieht. I often wished I could have been with 

o 

General Washington at Valley Forge, where the 
army lived on fried oysters, boiled chicken and red 
birds, and slept on corduroy carpet. He only missed 



fc. 



COLLECTIONS OF A COFFEE COOLER. 73 

but one good thing in his boyhood, and he has re- 
o^retted it ever since with the most resfretful kind of 
regret. He fell in battle, but he never felt in love; 
no look from maiden's tender eye ever pierced his 
manly frame ; the demon of infatuation never haunted 
him ; here I pause ; we found out he was an old 
fraud ; he had a wooden leg^, 'tis true, but he lost 
his unwooden leg by the bursting of a bologna 
sausage in a beer saloon, and so, one by one, we see 
our dearest idols crumble into dust. But to revert 
to my theme, fellow countrymen, this Fourth of July 
business is America's red letter day ; its memories 
kindle anew the cold embers and lights up the flames 
of last year's dormant devotion for our Starry Ban- 
ner. (Cheers.) Poets, philosophers and oratorial 
orators have stretched not only their imagination, 
but their suspenders, and sometimes a hemp rope, 
when supporting and propping up the pole of 
Liberty. We wander back to the valor and heroism 
displayed at Eutaw Springs and the Cow Pens ; but 
the screeching eagle invites them to back seats when 
the Fourth comes down like a wolf on the fold, and 
under its banner orators bold — (Cries, no poetry 
here.) Yes, the evening sun may sink to rest in his 
watery couch in the Pacific, and may forget to open 



COtlvECTlONS OF A COFFEE COOLER 



his winkers as he gets up east of Bunker Hill, but 
the glories of the Fourth shall never cease to be 
echoed and re-echoed from your orator's sound — to 
Puget Sound. Yes, guard your Liberties like unto 
your tea-renowned shores ; harbor your Freedom 
like George's Young Hyson ; boil it down, sugar it 
and preserve it ; bottle it, cork it up in your Con- 
stitution and By-Laws ; (cries of "more mortar,") 
remember the words of Patrick Henry ; the actions 
of Tippecanoe and Waterloo, will moulder away ; 
the great Alexander, the mighty Hannibal, with 
their thrones and empires, will be ground into atoms 
under the driving wheels of the chariot of Liberty ; 
(cheers,) but the old bell in Independence Hall will 
still clatter, when your orator and this audience shall 
have donned angelic overcoats lined with red, white 
and blue, and with the cardboard of admittance ap- 
proved well done, join in the chorus of Yankee 
Doodle Dandy with the white winged tribes, and 
with thrills of rapture flutter like sea-gulls up and 
down the beautiful shore, where the Fourth never 
ends, and the weary orators have rest. (Lights and 
orator blown away by the burst of applause.) 




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